AIBU to not be devastated that my DS has red hair

[EvenFlo]

I have a beautiful, healthy 7 week old son who is smiley and basically gorgeous (biased of course).

But shock horror he has a mass of red hair!!

The response I am getting to this from some people is utterly ridiculous - 'oh don't worry it will change', 'oh I am sure it will go blonde', 'oh he is lovely regardless'. This is usually accompanied by slightly sympathetic head tilts.

WTAF - he has hair that might be red (or dare I say ginger) - he doesn't have a bloody life threatening illness or contagious disease. It's just hair!

Does anyone have any suggestions for suitably cutting responses to these comments. It maybe I have it wrong - maybe having red hair is far more terrible than I am realising.

Rant over.

YANBU there's nothing wrong with red hair - I always think it looks nice on people.

I'm sure your DS is beautiful and would be no matter what colour of hair he had!

Agree 'did you mean to be so rude?!' Would be appropriate x

YANBU!

The old 'Oh do Fuck off dear/dick' mantra should do it.

I think it is awful for grown adults to be so openly prejudiced about a baby's hair colour.

They are twats, plain and simple. Would they say anything if child had black skin? Probably not because it would be obvious to everyone that they are ignorant racist twats. But to comment on ginger/red hair is somehow okay?

I really feel for children who get a bad time being bullied or teased because of this and it is infuriating that some adults never seem to grow out it either

The father of my dc had ginger hair and whilst I was pregnant the amount of negative comments I received regarding my babies having ginger hair was unbelievable. As it turned out both my children have brown hair.

I have often wondered if the almost universal dislike of ginger is a throw back from our caveman days when we went on gut instinct of being wary if anything was 'different'. The albino people in African countries seem to suffer the same prejudice!

A number of answers to that:

• Red/ginger is apparently the most popular hair dye colour.

• Red hair is lovely, it's distinctive, it often appears thicker & more lush than other colours.

• Tim Minchin said it better than me in his song, Prejudice. I'm not sure about linking as some people may find it offensive. I don't BTW & I have ginger tones.

on your behalf, how incredibly rude they are.

Congratulations on your red headed DS, and let them know that red headed men are the most virile pretty sure that's true!

My DSsis is a redhead and she absolutely glows, very indeed.

Congratulations on your absolutely gorgeous baby. Other people are being ridiculous if they indicate he is anything other. I'd just pick them up on their words eg 'why would I want it to change?' and 'regardless of what?' , they need to think about what they've said I reckon. Most should realise they've been dicks.

What wankers!
I think red hair is beautiful, bet he's gorgeous

Yanbu. It amazes me that adults think it is ok to laugh at ginger hair.

I have 2 dc with ginger hair. My mum has ginger hair so I should not have been surprised when ds2 was born with a ginger glow, but because ds1 had brown hair I assumed no 2 would be the same. I love it. I'm not sure if he does. He's now 13 and has had a few awful moments. In year 7 he was being bullied about his hair. He didn't tell me about it for a while and when he told me what people were saying, I was horrified - really horrible words. School dealt with it quickly.

Dc3 (dd1) has ginger hair too. I have noticed a different reaction with her. People tell me it's beautiful; people would pay to have that colour etc... Why is it different for a boy?

I always call their hair ginger or orange. It isn't red, it's orange.

YANBU, of course. It seems to considered an acceptable prejudice to express. And I loathe 'ginger' used as a noun to describe a red-haired person eg 'a ginger'. I grew up in Ireland where there are proportionally more red-haired people as a population percentage, and 'ginger'/'a ginger' was never used then (70s and 80s). You were red-haired, a redhead, or 'foxy'. I don't remember there being any particular teasing.

Having said that, some older Irish people retain a prejudice. I know my mother would have been secretly horrified if my son had been red-haired. I think she associates it both with travellers (I don't think travellers are more likely to be redheads, but a large family of red-haired travellers lived near us, which is why she makes an association), and standing out from the crowd, which is her worst nightmare. She would never say any of this, but I think she thinks it.

And unfortunately, while it's a very old prejudice (there's a tradition that Judas, the traitor, was red-haired, and red hair has been called 'judas-coloured' in the past), I think some of the modern roots of the prejudice in England come from a perceived association with Irishness.

OP, I wouldn't bother with smart put downs, which plays into the idea that red hair has to be defended. I would look baffled when someone says 'Oh, it'll change to a lovely blonde', and say, with a look of honest puzzlement 'What do you mean?' And when they say 'I mean, he may not always be stuck with being a ginger', say 'Sorry, you've lost me'. That way, the person has to explain their own dopey prejudices.

I have never and will never understand the issue with red hair. It is a thing of beauty. It's distinctive and rare, it should be something people are proud of. I envy red haired people, always have done. It's just stunning. A lot of models have it nowadays too and I've noticed it's become increasingly popular to dye your hair red too. I would have thought ginger discrimination was slowly dying out...

I don't even understand why there's discrimination against it anyway. It's a fecking hair colour ffs. First thing my mum asked when my DB and I were born was "are they ginger?" . Just horrid. Just tell people you don't want it to change, it's beautiful and so is he end of.

my xh was ginger, I was absolutely desperate for our children to inherit it. Nope, one has brown hair and the other honey blonde. Meh. I think it's a lovely colour.

I am his mum so am possibly biased but yes he is a gorgeous little thing. I love his hair because it's a really unusual colour and there is absolutely tons of it - he was born with a mohawk! I will certainly make sure he is proud of it as he grows up.

It is very frustrating that people would say anything negative about a baby, some of these people are mum's too which is even worse IMO.

I wish I had red , I have slightly reddish brown hair but nope. My mum had hair like Merida (Brave's) and I have a strawberry blonde son, but more blonde now i think.
One comment I've had repeatedly is 'at least 'it's not a ginger' after giving birth. With all of them . Once from a midwife. (One of the many reasons I had 3 home births).
I'm sad I haven't had and wont have a genuine red-head. And don't get the weirdness / bullshit.
Congratulations on your new ds, and extra for his gorgeous hair

My eldest son..now 22..has the most gorgeous fiery red hair..looks like it has strands of gold in it.When he was younger he was bullied a lot for being ginger but i always said these people were jealous because they were all bland and would disappear in a crowd! Whilst ds would be unforgettable! Helps that he grew to 6ft3 very young so they quickly left him alone! Must admit im quite jealous as i always wanted red hair..ah well back to the bottle.

I think Hawkmoth had it with the suggestion of 'Don't be a dick', to be honest. Be sure to say it with an appropriate measure of contempt.

Unbelievable what tossers people are!! Red hair is divine - so wish I had it, had my fingers crossed for my dc's but sadly no. If they say (sympathetic head tilt) "I expect it will change - he won't be ginger forever" you can bark "I bloody hope not - why be dull and ordinary like everyone else?".

Actually, if you get really fed up, you could paraphrase Winston
Churchill; he was accused of being sloshed by some woman and it went something like "I may be drunk but you are ugly and in the morning I shall be sober" so how about "he may be ginger but you are a twat and he could always dye his hair"

Congrats on your gorgeous red head.

'oh don't worry it will change', 'oh I am sure it will go blonde'

The response to these will depend on the hair colour of the idiot person speaking.

If they have blonde hair, the answers are:

"As long as it doesn't turn blonde. Now that would be terrible" and "God I hope not! Who'd want to be blonde?? Oh.....sorry...." (complete with look of sympathy)

If they have brown hair:

"As long as it doesn't turn brown. Now that would be terrible. Oh.....sorry." (complete with look of sympathy)

You need to get a babygro with this printed on it:
www.cafepress.co.uk/mf/66507347/ginger-superpower_tshirt?productId=631682121

I'd come back with "If you've nothing nice to say about X, I'd rather you kept your mouth shut"

I hate HATE hate the fact that not one person says anything if you have a blonde or brunette but heaven forbid that your child has red hair, then it seems like fair game (which is certainly isn't). Drives me scatty!

I have a little ginger/auburn 11 month old DS and he is gorgeous

My husband is auburn and I'm brunette and the comments that I got when pregnant were so rude - along the lines of here's hoping the baby doesn't inherit DH's hair and don't worry - red hair is recessive

Fortunately none of my family were such rude twats but interestingly one of the worst culprits was a black colleague - ironic

Towards the end I just used to state at people and say "well, anyway...." And change the subject as though they had just been unspeakably rude - which they had.

When DS was born - he quite early had ginger hair. What was lovely was the obstetrician held him up and said "oh what lovely hair - one of the chosen few!" Which I thought was lovely and I fully intend to tell DS that he is one of the "chosen few" when he is older

Jeez I've had this with my daughter, who is not totally ginger but a blonde / red and in some lights it has a definite tinge. I've had all sorts of comments like awwww she's ginger. Or oh it'll grow out

In the summer my rough neighbour and her daughter were hanging over the fence whilst we were eating our dinner and they commented on her hair colour and it was 'Awww she's ginger never mind' the daughter then said something similar. Like she had some growth on her face or something. I commented back that she has lovely hair and is gorgeous which some people will never be

I found my neighbours comments worse to swallow since she looks like red rum and her teeth are a shade of green.

I last said to one of my friends who commented that she hasn't got a birth mark or some awful disease, we don't need sympathy and I'm sick of the comments and they stopped now.

I've no idea how we got a baby with this hair colour but I was thinking some focus distant cousins have very red hair, the guy off skins is a family member and he's very ginger so maybe somewhere down the line we've a family of redheads.

I am positively evangelical about my DS red hair. People can't be twits.

Love red hair. Maybe send her this:

Lots of good looking red-headed men

Even if she doesn't like red hair, no need to be quite so rude!

OP I would take it as a signal to reply in kind. They have been unconscionably rude to you, so feel free to be equally rude back.

"Yes, he is ginger, but at least he doesn't have a nose like yours. Jesus, the size of it! Can you pick up RTE?"

Or similar. I don't see why you should have to accept their pig ignorant musings with good grace. It may thin the herd friend-wise so it depends how much it annoys you

DS has deep reddy brown hair which glows red in the sun. Green eyes too. He is absolutely fucking gorgeous (as I'm sure your baby is) and well dare anyone tell me otherwise.

People in this country are a bit weird about red hair IMHO. In Canada when I was growing up red hair was seen as quite special and beautiful.

YANBU (obviously)

Polite response is to leave a slightly awkward pause after stupid comment followed by "Anywaaaay...." as suggested above.

Less polite response: "are you effing kidding me you weirdo twat?"